The story about response to 2010 federal regulations can be found various places, including here.
Although the story focuses primarily on the University of California, Berkeley and the Kumeyaay Nation, it also mentions a variety of other universities, including the University of Michigan. Last month, UM’s NAGPRA Advisory Committee issued policies and procedures along with a cover letter. A previous post about the regulations can be found here.
An excerpt from The Island Packet:
The gambling resort would be within Hilton Head Lakes, a residential development on U.S. 278 — 18 miles from Hilton Head Island and three miles from Exit 8 on I-95. The United Keetoowa Band of the Cherokee Indians in Tahlequah, Okla., would own it.
Jasper County and city of Hardeeville councils passed resolutions endorsing the project Thursday and asked the state and federal government for support. The local leaders hailed it as a boon to Lowcountry tourism that could help cure chronic unemployment.
and
Under the federal Indian Gaming Regulatory Act, before a tribe can request that “off-reservation” land be taken into trust by the U.S. government for gaming purposes, the bureau must determine that doing so is in the tribe’s best interest and not detrimental to the surrounding community. The state’s governor must also agree.
“The governor has no intention of signing any memorandum of understanding that would enable casino gambling,” said Rob Godfrey, a spokesman for the first-term Republican.
An excerpt from the Register-Guard:
Logging practices on the Coquille Tribe’s forest are drawing attention locally and nationally as the tribe’s foresters work to balance ecological concerns with timber production.
The tribe, working with the Bureau of Land Management on an experimental logging project, has been recognized for stewardship on its own 5,000-acre forest, and is being sought for collaborative management by Coos County commissioners.
and
Rules that govern management on BLM’s 2.2 million acres of Western Oregon forests have been swatted around by lawsuits in recent years, with environmentalists calling for less logging and the timber industry demanding more.
Last year, U.S. Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar called for pilot projects from well-respected forestry researchers on ways to harvest timberland that leave bigger trees behind while giving managers a little more freedom in figuring out which trees to cut.
This story from CNN is one of several reports on a recent custody battle involving ICWA.
Tonight’s CBS Evening News included a story on fracking in Pavillion, Wyoming that can be found here.
The NPR story on the subject can be found here. An excerpt:
People in Pavillion, located on the Wind River Indian Reservation, contacted the EPA three years ago, complaining that their water smelled and tasted bad.
The agency started sampling drinking water wells in 2009 and found low levels of methane and other hydrocarbons in most of those wells. Although the levels did not exceed drinking water standards in most cases, the agency recommended that people get other sources of water for drinking and cooking, Encana, the company which drilled the wells, started providing water. The company says it provides drinking water to 21 households at a cost of about $1,500 per month.
The agency was concerned that higher concentrations of some of the chemicals might be lurking elsewhere in the aquifer.
So EPA researchers drilled two wells and found lots of chemicals, which could be tied to drilling. For example, they found levels of benzene, which is known to cause cancer and other health effects, far higher than safe drinking water standards. The presence of other chemicals — like synthetic glycols and alcohols — persuaded them that the contamination was likely coming from fracking.
Finally, a recent post about fracking can be found here.
Huffington Post article is here. An excerpt:
For many communities, the consequences also go beyond just health concerns.
“Traditional families are still very active in the smokehouse. They are still fishing for their primary source of living,” says Jamie Donatuto, an environmental specialist for the Swinomish Indian Tribal Community, in La Conner, Wash. “Fish are not just a source of nutrients, they have cultural and spiritual meaning for these people.”
Donatuto has been working with the Swinomish tribe for more than a decade on the issue. She recently conducted a survey and found that if tribal members had access to as much safe seafood as they wanted, they would consume more than 100 times the state’s estimate.
“In the Pacific Northwest, fish consumption is a way of life. It’s an important cultural hallmark of tribal nations that live here,” adds Elaine Faustman, a professor of environmental and occupational health studies at the University of Washington.
In fact, as she points out, it’s not uncommon to find kids “teething on salmon jerky.”
Journal announces new Publication Policy that can be found here. Currently accepting submissions on environmental law, science, and policy topics.
Bloomberg Businessweek article here. An excerpt
The largest American Indian tribe, the Navajo Nation, plans to issue its first bonds in a $120 million offering that would be the biggest sale of nongaming tribal debt in at least a decade. The tribe intends to use the money to create thousands of jobs and stimulate the economy on its reservation in America’s Southwest. Despite the Navajo Nation’s energy revenue, more than 37 percent of the reservation’s 170,000 residents lived below the federal poverty level in 2009. “I am concerned with the time when we won’t have revenues from our natural resources,” said Katherine Benally, head of the Navajo Nation Council’s resources and development committee, while taking a break from a council budget session in Window Rock, Ariz. “We need to be ready for that.”
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The Navajo bonds will be sold to institutional investors in a private placement as soon as yearend and will likely include both taxable and tax-exempt debt, says Goe, the bond counsel. The Navajos intend to seek investors willing to settle disputes in tribal courts, a first for a bond issue, Goe says. Clarkson says the requirement “would be a reaffirmation of the legitimacy of tribal courts—this time from the financial market.” Yet it may also make the issue harder to sell. Lyle Fitterer, who helps oversee $26 billion of municipal bonds at Wells Capital Management in Menomonee Falls, Wis., says the tribal-court stipulation “is one more hurdle in terms of investing in a deal like this” and could lead to the Navajos paying higher rates.
From Houma Today article:
Members of the tribe have created a digital petition on the White House’s website, “We the People,” which promises to provide an official response from the Obama administration if the issue can gather enough signatures in a month.
“The goal is to get federally recognized,” said Adam Credelle, who started the petition. Credelle is a United Houma Nation member from Patterson who currently attends law school at Southern University.
The United Houma Nation’s petition must get 25,000 signatures before Dec. 1. As of Friday evening, the petition had garnered 1,972 signatures since Tuesday, when it was launched.
Here is a link directly to the petition to get a presidential response: Federally recognize the United Houma Nation.
The first part of the article from SitNews:
The Superior Court for the State of Alaska, First Judicial District at Juneau, issued a decision with significant implications for tribal courts throughout Alaska in Central Council of Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska v. State of Alaska Child Support Services Division. The Court’s order on October 25, 2011, reaffirms the Tribe’s inherent jurisdiction to handle the full range of family law issues affecting its citizens, including the particular issue of child support for the benefit of tribal children.
The Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska’s Press Release can be found here.
The order can be found here.
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